Where did all the marketing plans go?
It may be because of the unpredictability of the world we live in or the popularity of agile approaches, but marketers seem to have abandoned marketing plans. The Royals’ Andrew Reeves makes the case for their return.
I recall University. Vaguely. Among the band comps, trips to the uni bar, frisbee sessions, and the general haze of life at nineteen there were also the classes. Actual in-person classes in tremendous lecture halls.
In those classes, I discovered the classics of marketing. The 4P’s. The hypodermic model of media. The definitive funnel.
It was a golden age of pre-programmatic marketing and advertising. A time when print and television monopolised the advertising landscape, the internet was dialed up (literally), and the first celebrity influencer was being created by some unsuspecting and soon-to-be proud parents someplace.
It was a simpler time by almost every measure of which there were only a few, mainly brand and sales. But the one thing there was a lot of focus on was marketing plans. These, we were told, were the foundations of a successful business.
As a strategy-minded human, I extraordinarily enjoy marketing planning. Working a brand strategy into a go-to-market plan, identifying target audiences, and figuring out tactics. Developing roadmaps and figuring out the hypotheses.
It’s the stuff that exponents like Mark Riston do very well to teach and sell.
“In the traditional world of marketing, we follow a similar systematic process. First, we build a map of the market from research in the form of a decent segmentation. From there we can decide which segments to go after and how to position our brand for optimum success. Finally, we devise clear strategic objectives for each target segment, specifying the goal we will achieve. Only then – with clarity on who, what, and when – do we start to think about tactical execution and which specific tools we might apply.” (Riston, Marketing Week)
But things have changed in recent years. Despite the access to great thinkers like Riston and all the marketing knowledge of the world at our fingertips, we seem to have abandoned marketing plans.
So, where have all the marketing plans gone?
As a head of strategy that works with a significant number of clients every year, and who speaks to other agency dwellers about it, it’s becoming clear to me that it’s rarer for clients to have well-articulated long-term marketing plans.
So what is happening?
Is it that marketers have replaced these plans with other forms of strategic planning?
I recently read a piece on Medium that suggested brand and business strategies have replaced the marketing plan. The reasons set out were that marketing and business operations are today more closely aligned and that business strategy is sufficient to drive core marketing functions.
In some businesses these functions probably are entwined, but in my experience, without specialist focus and emphasis this often makes the marketing very prosaic and functional.
Is it that budgets are fluid and unreliable?
This is definitely something we have to acknowledge. Due to various factors beyond the control of marketing teams – pandemic and beyond – the marketing budget often sits perilously close to the abyss, subject to cancellation, or reduction. Things change and so do plans.
Or perhaps marketers are favouring more agile approaches altogether?
Are they leaning into the models of software companies – agile planning and experimentation, which by their nature favour short-term results and constant iteration?
My guess is that most marketers haven’t watched King Richard, the captivating biopic of Venus and Serena Williams’ father Richard, which among other things illuminates the power of a very good and well-considered plan.
While a plan is a bet on the future, a good plan lets you prepare for eventualities, consider the market, figure out when your moments are, and identify your weaknesses. A good plan will help you escape the expected and shape creative opportunities that will deliver an X return.
And it is not hard. Marketers simply need to give themselves time to plan. To seek the right inputs. Work with smart people. Develop a strategy and tactics, and then execute that plan as best as possible.
Andrew Reeves is head of strategy Melbourne at The Royals.
Quick in, quick out… and why pay a middleman? So it seems.
User ID not verified.
..but how to shift the behaviour to favour more long-term outcomes?